44 • MED AD NEWS APRIL 2016
categoryone – agencies with income of more than $50 million

healthcare industry is changing rapidly. In addition to wins from major
pharma brands, new business in surgical robotics and also gene therapy
(AveXis) expanded the agency’s portfolio to reflect 21st century healthcare.

“The definition of treatment is
evolving, and it’s merging with technology,” Capan says. “We’re creating
mobile apps that will someday be prescribed as therapies. We’re marketing
a treatment program, Livongo Health,
that emphasizes tech, information and
human support over just medication.”
Intouch was awarded eight new
accounts as digital agency of record,
including several pre-launch assignments. The agency also saw the expansion of work in consumer healthcare products and aesthetics. Intouch
earned more than 40 awards for client
work in creativity, innovation, and social media in 2015, including awards
for clients Novartis, Galderma and
Teva, among others.

The agency strengthened senior
leadership with the addition of senior
VPs Kristi Veitch, Brady Walcott, and
Dirk Reinhardt. Veitch came to the
agency from VML to lead Intouch’s
human resources department. Walcott guides major business development efforts. Reinhardt now heads up
Intouch strategic planning services.

Several young Intouch up-and-comers were nationally recognized
for their accomplishments this year.
Medical Marketing and Media named
social media manager Andrew Gro-jean “Young Marketer of the Year.”
And Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak
and his wife Janet awarded Lindsey
Poulter, associate implementation developer, with a scholarship in information systems.

As healthcare, marketing, and technology continue to evolve, Intouch
Solutions has consciously advanced
its service offering to meet industry
needs.

In late 2015, Intouch Solutions ex-panded market access capabilities toestablish a formal division. The newgroup and enhanced services ad-dress the growing need for clients toreach market access and healthcareb2b stakeholders, executives say. Thefull-service solution is embeddedacross Intouch locations but is basedout of the firm’s New York office.Intouch also evolved its program-matic media buying services to a fullcenter of excellence – including anin-house, pharma-specialized trad-ing desk – one of very few in the in-dustry. The expanded offering meansthe agency can now manage complexmedia campaigns from start to finish,completely in-house.“Programmatic capabilities empow-er us to tighten targeting, align cre-ative, manage brand-safety, increasecross-campaign transparency, and bemore cost-efficient with client mediabudgets. It’s all in-house, and with alayer of pharma expertise on top,” Ca-pan says.

Also in 2015, Intouch fully deployed
its proprietary multichannel marketing process, Intune. Executives say Intouch applied Intune to its own strategic planning process and plans to roll
out a major new self-promotion campaign in 2016. Intouch also recently
established a data science discipline
to help wrangle Intune’s big data and
complement the agency’s aptitude for
analytics.

Agency leaders say there is no sign
Intouch is slowing down. The agency
achieved 160 percent growth over the
past five years, sustaining an “
impressive” 30 percent growth average.

“We reached $100 million, which is
definitely a major milestone,” Capan
says. “But we’re still growing, evolving
and innovating. We’re still having fun.
And there’s still so much more to do.”
Executives attribute much of the
agency’s success to lengthy, strong client relationships. Intouch leadership
says client loyalty has long been a hallmark of the agency’s success – even
when some clients occasionally stray.

“We have had some clients look at
other options, such as large consulting
firms,” Capan says. “They thought they
needed something different. But the
business comes back. And, of course,
we welcome them with open arms.”

Intouch associates say they love helping their communities and often go
above and beyond to help those in
need.